Basic nursing bottles have generally required a cylindrical bottle full of a feeding fluid with a pacifier directly attached thereon. Nursing a baby from a bottle has included many problems. Unless a proper orientation of the bottle is maintained, the infant is not properly fed, and often the infant starts to cry aloud until a parent or other caregiver to hold the bottle up to the infant.
Alternatively, the bottle must be propped up by blankets or any other crib accessories such as stuffed toys and/or stuffed animals. More often than not the baby must maintain a proper orientation of the bottle in order for it to be used.
In order to maintain the proper orientation, parents and caregivers try to allow the infant to directly hold the bottle. However, most newborns do not have the strength to support the bottle itself. Even older infants can have trouble lifting a bottle full of feeding fluid and maintaining the bottle at a proper feeding orientation.
Even if the bottle is reoriented infants have been known to become so upset that they often refuse to begin nursing again, and instead continue to cry out loud.
Still furthermore, the current bottles do not allow for parents/caregivers to easily assist the feeding liquid that is being passed from the bottle to the infant.
Over the years many devices have been proposed for modifying infant feeding bottles. See for example, U.S. Pat. No. 154,562 to Perkins; U.S. Pat. No. 2,558,195 to Pearl; U.S. Pat. No. 4,301,934 to Forestal; U.S. Pat. No. 4,796,628 to Anderson; U.S. Pat. No. 4,898,290 to Cueto; U.S. Pat. No. 4,994,076 to Guss; U.S. Pat. No. 5,040,756 to Via Cava; U.S. Pat. No. 5,421,496 to Korsinsky et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 5,772,685 to Crowe et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 6,033,367 to Goldfield; U.S. Pat. No. 6,139,566 to Bennett; and U.S. Pat. No. 6,197,044 to Clayton.
Pearl '195, Crowe et al. '685, Bennett '044, and Clayton '044 describe modifying pacifiers on nursing bottles but do not overcome any of the problems presented above.
Perkins '562 describes using an elongated tube connected to a pacifier for creating a vent that does not solve the problems described above. Cueto '290 and Guss '076 each describe attaching elongated tubes to baby bottles that do not allow for any drainage of the bottle contents. Anderson '628(FIG. 4), Forestal '934, Via Cava '756 and Korsinsky '496(FIG. 3) each describe bottles with elongated tubes connected to bottles that require brackets attached to other supports so that the bottles be maintained in inverted upside down above the infant that is not an easy way of solving the above stated problems. While a bracket may help with some of the problems referenced above, the brackets and/or supports add further problems since the bottles and/or parts of the brackets/supports can fall onto and injure the infant below.
Still furthermore, all of these elongated tube devices would additionally require physically bending the tube in order for the pacifier to be used by an infant. A rigid tube would be difficult to bend, and even if bent can become pinched and further cut off feeding the contents to the feeding infant.
Goldfield '367 describes an elaborate bottle nursing system using transducers/sensors and computers for nursing bottles that fails to provide a simple and easily attachable solution for solving the above stated problems with the prior art.
Thus, the need exists for solutions to the above problems with the prior art.